


Alone

by orlesiantitans



Series: 100 Themes [1]
Category: Dragon Age (Video Games), Dragon Age II, Dragon Age: Inquisition
Genre: F/M, M/M, Past Anders/Karl Thekla - Freeform, Past One-Sided Anders/Surana
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2015-12-16
Updated: 2015-12-16
Packaged: 2018-05-07 02:27:54
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Major Character Death
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,117
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/5440070
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/orlesiantitans/pseuds/orlesiantitans
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Anders knew loneliness. He’d known it after he’d been forced to kill Karl, he’d known it when he looked up at Hawke for months after they left Kirkwall and saw pain and hurt and coldness softened only by the soft warmth of love in her eyes. Nothing, not one second of that, compared to what he felt in that moment, staring at Varric’s familiar scrawl in front of him.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Alone

Anders had found himself alone so often that he often found himself realizing he was getting used to the sensation.

The first time had been the worst. He remembered it vividly, despite his tender years at the time. Clinging to his mother, half-hiding behind her skirts as the Templars told her they were taking her son to the Circle.

 _For his own safety, and the safety of others,_ they’d said.

He remembered his mother shaking as she packed his bags, despite the Templars saying he wouldn’t be able to keep much, if any, of it.

And for all his attempts at being brave, he was still just a child of seven years who didn’t understand what he’d done wrong. He hadn’t known he’d set the barn on fire when he’d gotten scared!

And he certainly hadn’t expected his father to give him up to the Templars, looking almost as frightened of his son as his son was of his powers.

But he was marched from his home in chains, his mother crying behind him, and placed in a dormitory with four other children and told he’d have to learn Common as soon as possible.

The first few months were lonely. He’d tried to escape in the sixth month, but had been caught not long after. He’d just wanted to home, to see his mother one last time, but he wasn’t even allowed that. He was trapped in that prison and he cried under his duvet each night, just wanting to find somewhere he could call home in the same way his little hut in the Anderfels had once been. And the other children in his dormitory weren’t great either. Jowan tugged on the end of his hair, making loud comments about it, but talking too fast for Anders to understand more than a few words per sentence. Two of the others, Fleur and Casper, spoke only to each other in constant Orlesian, usually looking at him as if he were dirty. And the fourth… he never learned her name. She was quieter even than he and spent most of her time with her nose buried in a book.

That all changed when Neria came to the circle. She was petite, even for an elf, and far too skinny to be healthy. Her hair was straw-blonde and soft and perfectly straight- and her eyes were far too big for her face but when she smiled upon entering her face lit up entirely and even with her front teeth missing she looked so pretty that he could have sworn his heart stopped in his chest.

He was ten years old and not too young for a crush and Neria Surana was the object of his affections.

“What’s your name?” she’d asked shyly, and he’d stumbled. Since he’d come to the circle, he’d not told anyone his name. But Neria was making him reconsider three years’ worth of silence.

He opened his mouth to answer, but Jowan beat him to it.

“Don’t ask him that question! That’s a bad question. He doesn’t tell people his name, he doesn’t even _talk_ , really, so we call him Anders from the Anderfels,” he told her, and Anders opened his mouth to admonish him- _I was just about to tell her, moron!_ \- but Neria just smiled and tucked a piece of hair behind her ear.

“It’s nice to meet you, Anders,” she replied, and he began hating his nickname a little less.

* * *

He had six years where he was… not _happy_ , but not entirely _miserable_ either. He still hated the Circle, and had grown to _despise_ the Templars, but that didn’t mean life in the circle hadn’t become _bearable_. He had friends- Neria being his closest, but he’d grown close to one of the mages who helped out in classes, Karl- and he’d even began to manage tolerating Jowan (and in his mind, that in itself was an achievement as the other mage was an unbearable twat).

And even though he’d brought the grand total of his escape attempts up to four, he figured that if he could get up his courage and admit to Neria how he felt, perhaps… perhaps he’d be able to handle everything a little bit better.

And on Neria’s sixteenth nameday, he strengthened his resolve and decided it was time to tell her how he felt.

He had a rose hidden behind his back, and was about to approach her when she stopped walking to talk with Knight-Recruit Cullen. Both were blushing high on their cheeks, and he felt his heart sink to the ground.

Of course. He’d been stupid to think he could have her. Not while the _damn_ Templars were around. They’d always take things away from him. His family, his freedom, those weren’t enough to sate their endless greed for Mage misery. No, no, now they had to take one of the only things he had left to care about. Neria.

What hurt even more was that she openly participated in the flirting, leaning in close to Cullen, and reaching out to place a hand over his breastplate. Though, logically, Anders knew it wouldn’t happen due to who they were, for her to like the Recruit that way…

It made him feel ill.

The rose was carelessly thrown onto the ground, delicate petals left to be crushed under the feet of all those who passed by, much in the same way Anders’ heart had been trampled under the toe of Neria’s delicate foot.

That night, Anders was dragged back into the Tower by his collar after escape attempt number five.

* * *

Despite the loneliness after Neria’s betrayal, he recovered soon enough- with Karl’s help.

Getting over Neria had been difficult but Karl made it… easier. Made the pain more bearable. The older man was there to comfort with his jokes and his flirtations and Anders enjoyed it. It was nice to have someone in that damn tower who wasn’t either in the pockets of the Templars- or a Templar themselves.

It was after Anders’ seventeenth nameday that he was Harrowed. It was make or break time for him- he’d either prove himself capable or show he was what all the Templars believed (and, he was sure, some hoped- just to get rid of him) he was. An abomination waiting to happen.

Luckily, it went without a hitch. A desire demon _did_ try to tempt him, but he’d resisted easily. He was determined to show he was worthy, to the point where even the power to defeat the Templars was not enough to make him an abomination.

That night he went to Karl, letting the older man congratulate him with his clever tongue and nimble fingers and teach him just what it meant to be with someone in that way. He’d curled himself around him, gripping him tightly.

He’d thought, perhaps foolishly, that he’d found someone to love. Someone who’d love him in return. But when he woke up the next morning, a note was on the pillow next to him.

> _Anders-_
> 
> _Thanks for spending the night. Unfortunately, I had to leave early before a Templar could find us (damn things seem to know whenever a mage is happy) but I had a nice time. Remember- don’t tell anyone! Even a brief association could get us killed._
> 
> _Regards_
> 
> _-Karl_

Anders had stared at the note in shock. Karl, his best (only) friend, the man he was in love with and who he’d given his virginity to… he’d left too. It was all he could do not to curl up and cry into his pillow. Eventually, he did, because he’d been left alone in bed by someone who clearly didn’t feel for him the way he did. He’d done his fair share of unrequited love, and he swore in that moment he’d never again fall in love.

Escape attempt number six led him to Lothering, where he stayed a few nights and encountered a beautiful Orlesian lay sister who taught him the art of loving a woman before the Templars found him (yet again!) in the Tavern. He was marched from the town in chains as the townsfolk gathered around him as though he were some kind of wonderful entertainment for their viewing.

On the edge of the town, Malcolm Hawke breathed a sigh of relief and clutched his children closer as Anders was pulled out of the village. Ten year old Marian smirked slightly and declared they’d have to eat all the food in the house that night in celebration, just as Carver poked her shoulder and told her they’d be eating all the food in the house _anyway_ , because if they didn’t he would _surely starve._

It wasn’t until years later that Marian had pointed to Anders and recounted the tale, and by that point he was a free man hardened by a constant fight against those who tried to hold him down.

* * *

Neria was thrown out of the Circle and into the Grey Wardens shortly after her Harrowing, two years after his own. He was nineteen years old and he watched her leave with jealousy building in the pit of his stomach.

She was free and he was still stuck in a fucking _Tower_. Perhaps he should have made more of an attempt to befriend Jowan- after all, he’d known he was trouble and he should have figured out he could benefit from that. Instead, he’d just let his emotions cloud his judgement, and he was stuck while she was free.

He’d rebuilt his friendship with Karl, and once he got over his own awkwardness it was almost back to normal. ‘Almost’ being the operative word- once he’d gotten his pesky feelings out of the way, the two of them took to meeting regularly in dark corners for a quick fuck. One time, in the library, Knight-Templar Cullen had actually walked in on them. Karl, who had Anders bent over in front of him in a semi-dark area, had told the man that they were just trying to find a book. The young Templar had left without questions, and it made Anders giggle giddily when he thought about it. Chantry boy had clearly never learned the ins and outs of male-on-male sex.

It was around six months after Neria got out that Anders made his seventh- and last- escape attempt.

And it was four months after that, in a dark room filled with the fallen bodies of the Templars that were supposed to be escorting him back to the Tower, that his entire life went to the Void.

* * *

Anders knew loneliness. He’d known it after he’d been forced to kill Karl, he’d known it when he looked up at Hawke for months after they left Kirkwall and saw pain and hurt and coldness softened only by the soft warmth of love in her eyes.

Nothing, not one second of that, compared to what he felt in that moment, staring at Varric’s familiar scrawl in front of him.

> _Anders-_
> 
> _I promised myself after Kirkwall that I’d never talk to you in any form again. I still don’t know what to think of you, still don’t understand your thought process but… I owe it to the man I thought I knew to say this._
> 
> _You know that Hawke came to help the Inquisition at my request. So it is my fault that she’s dead. They ended up in the Fade, physically, she and Alistair and the Inquisitor along with a small group of the Inquisitor’s Inner Circle, and she offered to sacrifice herself in order to give them time to escape._
> 
> _This is not the news you’ll want, I know, and it is not the news I wanted to deliver. But you know as well as I that if the Inquisitor had tried to leave Alistair in the Fade, she would have ended up with an armful of unconcious Grey Warden as Hawke ran off to sacrifice herself anyway. A cold comfort, I know, but all I have to offer._
> 
> _This is the last you’ll hear from me. For what it’s worth, I’m sorry. I know she meant a lot to you, even if you had a funny way of showing it, and I know she loved you as much as you did her._
> 
> _Varric._

Staring at that letter, a sour taste built in his mouth, and he felt such a profound anger well up in him, an anger that made him want to storm all the way to Skyhold and make the Inquisitor pay for the injustice she’d served Hawke. _She will pay…_

Instead, he just went straight to the nearest tavern and tried to fill the chasm he felt in his chest with their strongest ale.


End file.
